A pub on the ground floor and private dining on three floors above will return the former home of The Lady magazine in Covent Garden to the trade it was built for.
The Lady magazine left 39-40 Bedford Street in 2019, and the building has stood empty since. It was built as a public house, and its landlord, Shaftesbury Capital, wants it to be one again. The pub will keep the magazine’s name.
Shaftesbury Capital has applied to Westminster City Council to turn the whole building into a restaurant with a pub. The pub will serve bar food on the ground floor and take less than a fifth of the space there. Contemporary dining will fill the upper floors, with private dining across three of them, and the building will hold 450 people.
Inside, the offices are divided into many small rooms, and the floors above them were a single flat of about 5,000 square feet. The building is not listed but sits in the Covent Garden Conservation Area. The landlord says the new use needs no significant change to the outside.
The team from The Devonshire
Shaftesbury Capital names the tenant only as an award-winning operator with a record in Covent Garden and Westminster, whose chef holds two Michelin stars. A share of the operator’s profits will go to charity.
The team has been reported as the one behind The Devonshire on Denman Street in Soho: Charlie Carroll, Oisín Rogers and the chef Ashley Palmer-Watts. Westminster has approved their licence application, it has been reported, and the opening is expected in 2027. Reports also mention a roof terrace, which the landlord’s proposals do not show.
Proposed hours: Monday to Thursday 09:00 to 23:30; Friday and Saturday 09:00 to 00:00; Sunday 09:00 to 22:30.
The Lady, 39-40 Bedford Street, Covent Garden, London.